April Lady Read online

  Nell’s voice, would-be cheerful, but decidedly nervous, intruded on these ruminations. ‘You are very silent!’ she said.

  ‘I beg pardon!’ he said. ‘I was thinking.’

  ‘About – about this?’ she asked anxiously.

  ‘No,’ he said unblushingly. ‘Thinking we should take a look-in at Gunter’s. You’d like an ice, I daresay. Just the thing!’

  She thanked him, but declined the treat. She would have declined the offer of a chair to carry her home, too, but on this point Mr Hethersett was firm, knowing well what was due to her consequence. To be strolling through the streets of London with only himself as escort would not do for Lady Cardross. So he beckoned to a couple of chairmen before suggesting to her that he should do so, handed her into the chair, and completed his politeness by walking beside it to Grosvenor Square, and engaging her in a commonplace conversation that gave her to understand that he had dismissed the episode in Clarges Street from his mind.

  Six

  Rescued from the perils of Clarges Street, and restored to the shelter of her own house, Nell hardly knew whether to be grateful to Mr Hethersett for having thrust a spoke in her wheel, or resentful. When the moment had come for knocking on Mr King’s door she had certainly been extremely reluctant to do so, and had suffered very much the same sensations as if she had been about to have a tooth drawn; but her dependence now was all on Dysart, whom she had not seen since the night of the masquerade, and who might, for anything she knew, have taken a pet at having his ingenious plot frustrated, or (which was even more likely) have forgotten all about her troubles. She and Letty were going to the Opera that evening, where it was extremely improbable that she would meet him; so she wrote a letter to him, telling him how urgent her need had become, and begging him he would call in Grosvenor Square.

  She had hardly dispatched this missive, by the hand of her footman, when Letty came in. In general, when Letty went shopping, she returned laden with parcels, and eager to display to her sister-in-law a collection of expensive frivolities which had happened to catch her eye; but on this occasion she had nothing to show but a disconsolate face. She said she had had a stupid morning, but when Nell asked if she had been able to find a muslin she liked, she replied: ‘Oh, yes! Martha has it. I met my cousins, and went with them to Grafton House, all amongst the quizzy people. Selina would have me go, because she said there were amazing bargains to be had there. I must say, they had a great many muslins. I chose a checked one, but I daresay I shan’t like it above half when it is made up. It cost seven shillings the yard, too, and I don’t consider that a bargain, do you?’

  ‘No, but checked muslin is always dearer than the plain colours. I hope the Miss Thornes are quite well?’ Nell said politely.

  ‘Yes – at least, I didn’t enquire. Selina seemed pretty stout. Fanny was gone with my aunt to Mrs Mee, to arrange to have her likeness taken. They are persuaded Humby means to come to the point, and Selina says my aunt and uncle are in transports, though I can’t think why they should be, for he presents a very off appearance, don’t you think? besides having some odd humours.’

  ‘I don’t know that. I believe he is very respectable,’ Nell responded, wondering whether her cousin’s approaching betrothal was accountable for the clouded look on Letty’s vivid little face. ‘I collect it was Mrs Thistleton, then, who was with Miss Selina Thorne?’

  ‘Yes, and I can tell you I was soon wishing her at the deuce!’ said Letty, with a disgusted pout. ‘She is increasing, and bent on telling the whole of London! You would suppose no one had ever before been in her situation, for she can talk of nothing else! And then what must we do but walk into Lady Eastwell! She expects to be confined next month, and nothing could be like her simperings and sighings and affectations! Sir Godfrey is aux anges over the petit paquet she means to present to him. Petit paquet! Un très grand paquet, I should think, for I never saw anyone so large! I was vexed to death, dawdling along in her company, and being obliged to listen to such insipid stuff! And Maria at least was used to be the most entertaining creature! I do hope you won’t turn into a bothersome bore when you start increasing, Nell!’

  The colour rushed up into Nell’s cheeks; she said: ‘I hope not, indeed!’ but in a constricted voice, for Letty’s careless words had touched her on the raw. It was some months since Lady Pevensey, tearing herself away from her stricken lord to visit her daughter, had soothed an anxiety which was even then teasing Nell. ‘Think nothing of it, dearest!’ she had said, adding, with simple pride: ‘You are like me, and you know I had been married for three years before dear Dysart was born.’

  Nell had been comforted; and although the prospect of being obliged to wait for three years before she gave Cardross an heir was dismal, it was permissible to indulge the hope that she might find herself in an interesting situation considerably earlier than had Mama. And since Cardross, neither by word nor by look, gave the least sign of disappointment, and her mind was pleasantly occupied with the manifold gaieties of fashionable life, she had not thought very much about it. But Letty’s petulant remark was ill-timed: her quite uninteresting situation now seemed to Nell of a piece with all the rest of her iniquities. She was proving herself to be in every way a deplorable wife: foolish, deceitful, spendthrift, and barren!

  Fortunately, since her deep blush betrayed her, Letty had picked up the latest number of the Ladies’ Magazine, and was contemptuously flicking over the pages, and commenting disparagingly on the fashions depicted in this valuable periodical, so that Nell had time in which to recover her countenance.

  ‘Good heavens, I never saw anything so dowdy!… Slate-coloured twilled sarsnet, lined with white – what a figure to make of oneself!… Do these new Bishop-sleeves hit your fancy? I don’t think them pretty at all, and as for this evening gown, with French braces over the bodice – !’

  ‘I liked the picture of the pelisse, with the round cape,’ Nell said, trying to infuse her voice with interest.

  ‘For my part, I think it no more than tolerable. Unless one is a regular Long Meg, those capes make one appear positively squat! Hair-brown merino, too! Horridly drab!’ Letty cast the Ladies’ Magazine aside, and, after hesitating for a moment, said, in a voice whose carelessness was a little studied: ‘By the by, I shall have to cry off going with you to Somerset House tomorrow, Nell. Selina has been telling me that my aunt is hipped because I have not been to visit her quite lately, and is saying she had not thought I could show such a want of affection, or have my head turned so utterly that I don’t any longer care to be with her. You know how it is with her! She is cast into raptures, or down in a minute. So, if you do not very particularly wish to look at pictures tomorrow – I daresay they will be a dead bore, too! – I think I should go to my aunt’s, and make her comfortable again.’

  Nell agreed to it, though she might, had she been less preoccupied, have wondered at Letty’s sudden concern for Mrs Thorne’s comfort. That Mrs Thorne might be piqued by a lack of proper observance could surprise no one who knew Letty, for without having the least ill-nature, or want of disposition to render attention where it was due, she had never been taught to consider the feelings of others, or to consult any convenience but her own. Having so easily won Nell’s acquiescence, she took herself off to her own bedchamber, there to peruse for the third time the very disturbing letter she had received from Mr Allandale.

  Nell waited in vain for Dysart to put in an appearance that afternoon. Her footman brought back no answer to her note, his lordship having gone out. No, his lordship’s man had not been able to say when he expected him to return.

  His lordship did not return to his rooms, in fact, until an advanced hour of the day; and since he was engaged to dine at Watier’s, with a select company of his intimates, and afterwards to try his luck at that most exclusive of gaming-clubs, it was rather too much to expect him to keep the best dinner in town waiting while he danced attendance in